Multiple records incorporating at least a portion of duplicated content are commonly generated in various organizations and enterprises. These duplicate records arise because of many reasons. They arise because of mergers of information databases resulting from alliances, acquisitions or mergers of companies, for example. They may also arise because of processing inefficiencies, data entry errors and mistakes as well as errors due to external factors and a lack of effective integrated record processing technology. Once created the redundant record information may result in further propagation of errors and mistakes and represents an additional storage and overhead burden unless the duplicate records are consolidated into a single record containing pertinent required information.
In the health care field, for example, health care providers and networks merge, form alliances and participate in community health information networks. As a result patient medical information from various disparate systems is stored in large databases or in one or more Electronic Master Patient Indexes (EMPI). If a patient has more than one record in an EMPI, it is possible that different patient clinical information, obtained during separate patient health care visits, is stored in different unrelated records. This results in a segmented patient record which may result in incorrect treatment being prescribed as well as drug interaction problems and may even result in the patient receiving no treatment and medication being delivered to the wrong person. Consequently, the existence of multiple segmented health care records for an individual patient exacerbates the likelihood of error in treatment of the patient and billing for services delivered to the patient. Further, the existence of multiple segmented health care records including duplicate information portions for an individual patient results in additional patient dissatisfaction since it is likely to lead to repetitive interrogation of the patient regarding health care history and circumstances.
A system according to invention principles addresses these problems.